


Prima Facie

by manic_intent



Series: Caveat Emptor [2]
Category: Dragon Age
Genre: M/M, Mage Hawke - Freeform, Postgame canon, Slash, Speculative Dragon Age 3 fanfiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-10
Updated: 2011-12-10
Packaged: 2017-10-27 04:09:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/291470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/manic_intent/pseuds/manic_intent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For beingevil, who requested a continuation to Caveat Emptor!verse, the one where Male!Hawke falls in love with Anders' son (cough), prompt: Elder God Shenanigans.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Prima Facie

**Author's Note:**

> This fic will not make sense unless you've read the previous one. :) This was written en-route to Singapore from Melbourne.

I.

The boy later known as Urthemiel first meets Uriel Hawke when he is a child, one of many barefooted children in the motley gangs carving out their shifting territories in the vast playground of revitalized Darktown and gentrified Lowtown, a childhood of minor thefts, pranks and mayhem. He is the son of a shoemaker and his wife, or so he believes at the time, and he is named Ezrah Friar. It is a good time to be young.

Kirkwall stands neutral from the Chantry's March, and children born with a spark of magic grow up with a much bemoaned compulsory Gallows education, returning to their friends and their family every late afternoon with armfuls of books and airs of sulky resentment. Ezrah is born with no magic and only a vague conception of history, and to him, as to the rest of Ezrah's gang, the elvhen child Malia is not so much an abomination-in-progress as a valued member of the gang, able to create light in dark places or an instant distraction in a tight corner by spinning stinging, glowing globes out of nothing at all. It's a prized ability in a pack of street rats, and it's gotten them out of any number of scrapes, especially with their arch enemy, the Lowtown baker Jathorp Axelr.

Axelr is a plump, unlovely man constantly dusted in flour, small eyes sunk in a facial landscape of soft dunes and sagging jowls, wide mouth usually set in a grimace of distaste, strident voice often raised in protest, against his hapless, pale wisp of an assistant, his quiet, mousy wife, or the packs of young thieves to which a successful theft of any of Axelr's famous pastries is a feat worthy of a week's boasting.

The fastest and most agile of them all, Max, carries their prize aloft, the blueberry pie wrapped in purloined tablecloth as they pelt down an alleyway, Sofia and Peth scouting ahead, Malia beside Max, Ezrah taking up the rear, and behind them their enemy bellows with outrage, rolling pin aloft, ignoring the globes of light that Malia spins his way and the barrels and crates that Ezrah overturns in their wake.

They're nearly at the tailor's, with its easy scale of stacked crates to the rooftops where Axelr will never catch them, and Sofia is laughing, ahead of them, wild with exhilaration; it's contagious and Malia grins even as Ezrah rolls his eyes. He's been leader and instigator of enough campaigns to know that it isn't safe to celebrate until they're home.

Max scales the crates easily, all quick, lithe hops up to the roof, Sofia and Peth after, and Ezrah pushes Malia quickly up onto the first crate even as she turns to throw more light at their pursuer. "Don't," Ezrah hisses, "Hurry!"

"You head up first," Malia shoots back, "I'll distract him."

"No, we keep to the plan," Ezrah disagrees, even as Peth shouts from up high and then Axelr puts on an impressive turn of speed.

Ezrah twists with a yelp as he is lifted bodily into the air, Malia beside him, and Axelr snarls, "Got you both, you brats, you thieves, I'll teach you to steal-" which is as far as he gets, because Sofia hops down a crate and launches herself at them, screeching, Peth after, and then they're a rolling, confused lump of biting brats and flailing baker and sharp elbows.

A firm, stern, "What's all this, then?" cuts through the scrum, and partially squashed under Axelr's arm, hanging on to it with all his weight and lying on his back, Ezrah stares up into the face of a tall man, dressed in a simple, well-cut maroon jacket, dark breeches tucked into gleaming black boots, a merchant, perhaps, or a nob down in Lowtown for business. Behind him, the tailor stares at them both, anxious, and there's another stern-faced man with similar features, if dressed in the heavy, silver armor of a Hunter, with its crossed blade.

They untangle themselves with some embarrassment, and through the corner of his eye, Ezrah sees Max peeking at them, from behind a chimney, and he half-shakes his head. Max ducks out of sight.

"Nothing to concern yourselves with, your lordships," Axelr puffs, red-faced from exertion and sporting bites on his right arm - Sofia is vicious when she's angry. "These brats stole from me, and I'll be setting them right soon enough."

"Really," The nob eyes all of them carefully, as though memorizing their faces, and Ezrah tenses. "And what did they steal, good sir?"

"A blueberry pie," Axelr says, self-importantly.

"And where would this pie be?" The nob asks, so very reasonably.

Axelr glares at them, then up at the roof, but Ezrah and his friends stare up at him innocently, and Max is out of sight. Axelr turns redder than ever, scowling. "Well then, there was one more of them, and he must have got away."

"Possession is nine tenths of the law, my dear sir," The nob's expression stays solemn, "But in the spirit of fairness I will pay you for this pie, and we can all part ways. Is that acceptable?"

Axelr peers at the nob and Ezrah can see his little mind working. The nob might not be richly dressed but he's clearly wealthy, and he hasn't seemed interested in the price. "Three gold coins."

"They're sold for a gold piece and fifty silver," Ezrah cut in, and holds Axelr's eyes defiantly when Axelr scowls at him. "Well, they are."

The edges of the nob's eyes seems to crinkle briefly, as if in amusement, but he solemnly counts out three gold pieces from his purse and hands them over. "There we are, sir. Do have a good day."

"I will." Axelr looks nervous, for a moment, then the gold coins disappear into his pockets. "Thank you, sir."

They watch as Axelr struts away, and when the baker is out of sight, Sofia mutters, "You overpaid."

Malia pinches her pointedly on the arm, and drops a curtsey at the nob. "Thank you for your help."

"Well, at least one of them has decent social graces," the Hunter grumbles, from behind the nob. "Can we go now, Uriel?"

"I thought that it might be important to teach them a life lesson, Carver," Uriel-the-nob notes dryly. "Thieving is illegal, children. You understand that, don't you?"

Peth opens his mouth, but Ezrah quickly steps forward. "Look, it was my idea. And I did it. My friends just joined in after, that's all. You let them go, I'll talk to you."

Malia squeaks in protest and Sofia bristles, but Ezrah glares at them until they subside, and when he looks back up, Uriel is grinning at him, clearly amused. "What's your name, boy?"

"Ezrah Friar."

"Friar... you're Eason Friar's son, then? The shoemaker?"

"Maybe," Ezrah hedges, suspicious. It's one thing to get himself into trouble. It's another to involve his parents.

"Well then, Ezrah Friar," Uriel goes down on his haunches, long limbs stretched over his knees, "I count you in debt to me for three gold coins, and should I ever hear of you breaking the law again, I'll be calling for the debt from your parents. Understand?"

"No," Ezrah scowls at him, folding his arms. "I can get you three gold coins in a day, easy."

"Legitimately?"

"You won't hear otherwise," Ezrah shoots back, after a moment's pause, and Uriel raises an eyebrow even as Carver guffaws.

"We have a regular criminal in the making there, Uriel."

Uriel ignores him. "Well then, Ezrah Friar, should I hear of you again you will work off those three gold coins, plus interest, via the performance of menial work at my estates. Better?"

Ezrah considers this. It's unlikely that they'll ever see the nob again, and it's even more unlikely that the nob will be keeping track of one child from the large ragtag number that call Lowtown and Darktown their territory. He knows good odds when he sees them. "Deal," he says, and spits in his palm, holding it out, in the traditional promissory seal of the street. Rather to his surprise, Uriel does the same, shaking his hand firmly.

"And one more thing," Uriel adds, as he straightens up. "Just for your reference, isn't the elvhen quarter just behind the baker's? He won't follow you in there. Axelr's not fond of the 'knife-ears'."

Sofia and Peth are staring at the stranger as though he's sprouted fur, and Carver groans, "I knew you were going to be a bad influence somehow," even as the nob nods soberly at them all and strides past, towards the main street.

Once he's gone, Ezrah gestures at the roof, and turns to Malia only when they're safe. "Axelr doesn't like elves?"

"Well," Malia squirms a little, "He isn't willing to sell food to us, if that's what you mean. Says we're dirty. The _hahren_ said that it's because of a circle of violence. I'm not sure what she means by that."

"He thinks you're dirty? _He's_ dirty," Max interjects loyally, slipping out from behind the chimney. "Who was that, Ezrah? That nob?"

"Don't know." Ezrah frowns down at the street, after the figures of the nob and the Hunter weaving through the crowd, "Hopefully we'll never see him again."

II.

The second time Ezrah meets Uriel he already knows him for who he is, and besides, even if he hadn't, this time Uriel _Hawke_ is dressed in his usual armor, with the wolf's fur over his shoulders, his black leather vest baring scarred and surprisingly muscular arms for a the most powerful mage in Kirkwall, still as lean and rangy as the animal whose fur he wore, some silver now flecked in his hair. He is standing in the courtyard of the Hightown boulevard, arguing with his brother Carver; a huddle of robed mages stand to one side, as though watching for fireworks.

The possible leader of the huddle is a blonde man, taller than Hawke, wearing an expression of careful patience, several days' worth of stubble darkening his jaw. Beside him, rather to Ezrah's surprise, is Malia, who looks pale, tired but defiant. He turns quickly to look to Max, who straightens up with a blink and nudges him in the ribs with an elbow.

Quickly, they sidle through the gathering crowd and behind the huddle of mages, and Ezrah makes the low, hooting whistle that he had come up with, years and years ago when they were street rats stealing pies from hapless tradesmen. Malia stiffens instantly, looking around, then she spots them and murmurs something to the blonde man. He nods, and she slips away. Neither of the Hawkes seem to care.

"What are the two of you doing here?" she hisses, once she's within earshot. Thankfully, the crowd seems disinclined to eavesdrop, staring instead in fascination at the rather public fraternal dispute.

"We still live in Kirkwall, Malia," Max points out dryly. "What are _you_ doing here? Didn't you go off to Cumberland? How's the revolution going? Set fire to some of the Chantry faithful recently?"

The tips of Malia's ears redden. "At least I'm not still skulking around in Lowtown, pretending that the world doesn't exist. You've both joined the Coterie, haven't you? Sofia told me! At least _she_ 's in the guard!"

"Max, Mal, please," Ezrah cut in sharply. "Look, we haven't seen each other in years. Peth too, wherever he's sailed off to. How are you, Mal?"

Malia glares at him for a long moment, her lower lip trembling, then she sighs and rubs a palm over her eyes. "The war isn't going well. The runes... we don't have a solution for the runes, yet. The Warden-Commander's joined in, but it hasn't made a huge difference. She's waiting on something, though. I think she's holding back, until then."

"Holding back?" Max echoes, just as Ezrah asks, "What's she looking for?"

"I don't think it's something that you can steal," Malia determines, if halfheartedly. "It's a person. Living in Kirkwall."

"Well, we could help you there," Ezrah offers, as Max opens his mouth. "The Coterie knows all the contacts. All the lookouts. If you can get us a description, I'll find whoever it is for you in two weeks, tops. Free of charge, for old times."

"Thanks, Ezrah," Malia sighs. "But we don't have a description. The Warden-Commander knows that it's a boy, probably a young man around my age, but that's about it. Nobody knows what he looks like, or what he can do."

"How do you know he's still in Kirkwall?" Max inquires.

"That's another thing. We don't." Malia scowls. "I bet the Warden-Commander knows, actually, but isn't telling. It'll be just like her. Dieter - that's the Enchanter over there, the tall blonde one - was cursing her all the way here."

"Sounds fishy to me," Ezrah observes, frowning. "Well, do you have anything on this at all?"

"We've got a sphere - Dieter has it actually. The Warden-Commander gave it to us. We're going to bind it to a platform here. He's got it under his arm."

Ezrah follows the line of sight from Malia's finger. Under Dieter's arm is a glass ball, slightly larger than an apple, and in the center of it, suspended by apparently nothing, was a blue fleck, like a piece of glass. As he stares at it, it seems to glow briefly, turning a pale, sky blue before fading back to a dark navy. "What does that do?"

"Apparently when the right person touches it, we'll know," Malia shakes her head slowly. "Bitch. She was so condescending when she said that, too. I don't know why Dieter puts up with her. I think that she scares him. She knew his father or something."

"He seems used to playing with tigers," Ezrah observes dryly. Dieter, seemingly tiring of the argument, has waded in, palms outstretched as though trying to calm down two fractious horses. "Look at that. And the Hawkes are actually listening to him. Who is he again? His father was a friend of the Warden-Commander?"

"Apparently. He's also one of the senior Enchanters of the Cumberland mages. I know, he's young, but he's quite capable," Malia notes proudly. "I'm studying illusion under his guidance. He's also friends with Uriel Hawke. You know, I told him that story," she adds, when Ezrah arches an eyebrow. "The three gold coins one. He laughed."

"Oh, that," Ezrah mutters irritably, even as Max smirked. "Anyway, if you just leave that ball in the open, it'll get stolen."

"That's not the problem, we'll have spells up. The problem is getting the Hawkes to agree to leave it here. Carver doesn't agree. Uriel's a little more inclined to be reasonable."

Ezrah winces at Carver's sudden, loud snarl of, "... _and it's just because of your Maker damned curiosity, brother!_ " and Uriel's quiet, even retort of, "This is my city, Carver. On civic matters, I make the decisions. Yes?"

Carver's expression is stormy as he throws up his hands. "On your head be it then, Uriel!" and he strides away, shaking with temper, Hunters closing ranks behind him. Uriel's shoulders slump a little, and he speaks quietly with Dieter for a moment before his mouth creases into a brief, odd smile, and Ezrah looks away, suddenly embarrassed. It would appear that the Viscount and the Enchanter are rather more than 'friends'. Max coughs, and the crowd begins reluctantly to dissipate now that the entertainment seems to be over.

"Malia?" Dieter calls, from the group, and she ducks her head.

"Um, I have to go. Maybe we'll do dinner sometime. All three of us, and Sofia. Somewhere nice." Malia doesn't seem too hopeful, but she clasps Max's hands, then Ezrah's. "I'll be at the Keep."

The sphere sits chained and inanimate on a hastily built plinth under the spreading oak at the center of the courtyard, chained to it by a length of sturdy, magicked steel, and after a while it stops being an object of curiosity. Ezrah doesn't bother touching it - word files through the Coterie ranks that Doktor Indigo will be _very_ displeased if anyone in the guild was found tampering with it, or worse, trying to steal it.

He does, however, pause briefly one night on his way to the Blooming Rose to settle a set of Coterie accounts with the matron. A woman is seated demurely on the bench beside the plinth, her wealth of white hair bound up behind her skull in deep red ribbons, shaped oddly like horns, and she is dressed in a strange suit of chainmail and leather, all dyed a deep maroon. Her eyes are a disconcerting shade of feral yellow, and her face seems ageless. She nods at him as he hesitates.

"Ezrah Friar."

"Milady," Ezrah replies warily, having been brought up to be polite, his fingers twitching for the daggers at his belt. "Do we have business?"

"Perhaps." The woman smiles. "Do you know me, boy?"

"No," Ezrah shakes his head, then he frowns even as he says so, narrowing his eyes. There is something vaguely familiar about the woman's face, about her queenly bearing as she rises to her feet, about the sharp, acerbic bite to her tone. "I've never seen you before."

"Maybe. Maybe you haven't." The woman smirks at him. "Have you had a go with the sphere, Ezrah?"

Ezrah is fairly sure that he heard his name, but underlying that, like an echo, is something else altogether, a longer word, on the edges of his consciousness. He gropes for the shape of it, the sound, but it slips through his fingers. "Coterie's orders are to leave it be."

"Oh, I'm not suggesting you steal it, or break it," the woman drawls. "Just to pick it up. It's a curious little bauble, isn't it? Doesn't it gleam bright when you look close, Ezrah?"

Ezrah can hear the word now, a whisper, like a spell, a discordant note. _Urthemiel_. He frowns at her, his hands closed on the hilts of his daggers. "You're a mage, aren't you?"

"Only technically." The woman folds her gauntleted arms under her bosom. "Well then, boy?"

"I don't see the point."

"Humor me, then," the woman smiles, but there's nothing friendly about it all. "Or are you afraid, Urthemiel?"

"That's not my name," Ezrah snaps, a little annoyed now, but he's never turned down a dare in his life and he isn't about to start now. He marches over sullenly to the sphere, only to glance up at an incoming patter of footsteps and jingling armor. The Hawkes, followed by Dieter and the city guard's commander, the sour-faced woman known as Aveline, burst into the courtyard from the direction of the Keep. Uriel scowls as he stares at the woman, and marches forward.

"What are you doing here, Flemeth?"

"Any time now, boy," Flemeth ignores the interruption, her tone mocking, and despite his sudden reservations, Ezrah puts his hand on the sphere.

He's dimly aware of the world... folding, for want of a better word, all the edges and outlines of it creasing into each other, like a fresh painting drenched by a pail, and then it eddies outwards and upwards, going smaller, brighter, and Ezrah blinks slowly as the woman beside him becomes some sort of _overlay_ , like several images of women interposed on each other. There is a very old, stooped woman, a young, fresh-faced girl with eyes sharp with malice, and something more, a fading image, glowing a pale gold, that twists occasionally into something serpentine.

Across the courtyard, the surprisingly smaller figures of the Hawkes and the others back off, weapons raised, all interposed images, young, old, and something more, a blur of unreality, Ezrah decides, trying to frown, and he turns to Flemeth to demand an answer- and hears a rumbling growl instead, like the edge of a storm. Startled, he tries to shuffle backwards, only for something to shatter behind him; he looks around, the balcony of the mezzanine floor of the marketplace oddly low, beneath his head, and a scaly tail the color of purple so deep that it is almost black lifts itself from a freshly cracked seam along the stonework.

It takes him a very long, astonished moment to realize that it is _his_ tail.

He turns to glare at Flemeth again, to try and get her to remove whatever spell it is that she's cast on him, then an arrow skitters off his shoulder. It doesn't hurt, and he can hear Uriel snapping at Aveline to hold her fire, but confused, disoriented and wary, Ezrah rears up, and then he realizes that he _knows_. He knows what the blurs of unreality are, what the name of the tree that he stands beside is, where the stones under his claws were birthed, the name of the wind that billows under his spreading wings, the slow heart-pulse of the earth beneath his talons. And he knows that if he gathers himself by his haunches and leaps upwards-

Flying is like nothing he has ever experienced. He leaves the human city behind, bellowing a gout of blue flame into the night sky as he banks and rolls, the chill of the night air pulling at the tips of his leathery wings as he takes himself over the Planarscene, the wake of the wind from his passage stirring a passing pack of wolves to howling and whimpering, shaking the leaves from the tips of the conifers. Roaring, Urthemiel makes another circuit around the vast forest, lazier this time, playing with the updrafts, and then there's another roar, from another dragon, in the distance, and he turns to meet her, curious.

It's a smaller dragon, a dark red in color, and as it roars at him again he knows her name. Flemeth is but one of many. He inclines his head at her but ignores her as he dips down, over the Waking Sea, the tips of his wings sleeting into the water as he drops low, further, and then he's climbing up again, in one sheer loop of exhilaration and another gout of flame.

It's sometime later when, rather embarrassed, he lands on the beach by the sea where Asha'belannar waits sedately, her scaly tail curled around her. She blurs in a golden wash of color, and assumes her human form; watching her, Urthemiel understands the way of it, the folding and the reshaping of the outer threads, and soon Ezrah is blinking on the beach, rather chilled.

"Grandmother," he addresses Asha'belannar, then he frowns. The memory of everything, the sense of perfect understanding, is fading quickly.

"Urthemiel," Asha'belannar inclines her head.

"Let's go with Ezrah for now," Ezrah suggests weakly. "This is going to be difficult enough to explain to my parents as it is."

III.

Dieter is an extremely stubborn man, and after two weeks of harassment, Ezrah irritably agrees to go to Cumberland with him. He has no interest in the war, and he's rather wary of the way it had _felt_ , being something other, something _more_. It had frightened him, once he had been calm enough to think about it all, and Ezrah greatly disliked being frightened.

Uriel looks as though he's aged several years when Ezrah, prodded by Malia, sulkily declares this to him in his office. Dieter beams paternally to a side, even when Uriel glances over to him, resigned. "Still rather young for war, isn't he?"

"I wasn't much older than that when I signed up, Uriel." Dieter's smile is fondly indulging, and Ezrah feels uncomfortable all over again as Uriel's expression twists. There's something rather pathetically intimate in how Uriel gets to his feet, circles around the desk and pulls Dieter into a tentative embrace, and Malia clears her throat and stares at her feet even as Ezrah pretends to study the books on the shelves to his left. Dieter sighs, a low, ragged sound, and whatever it is between them seems like a shaky, broken thing, all sharp, unforgiving edges.

"Go then," Uriel mutters, and Ezrah realizes with a start that the ruler of Kirkwall is standing before him. "Ezrah Friar, remember our little agreement with the three coins?"

"I've got three gold coins right here, your excellency," Ezrah grouses.

"I think a rather considerable amount of interest has accrued by now," Uriel retorts, his dark eyes narrowed and hard. "But I'll consider your debt to me well repaid if you would keep Dieter safe. His hereditary madness is contagious and it looks like you've been sucked into it after all."

"Fine," Ezrah agrees, rather startled. "I've got nothing against him." Besides, Malia seems rather fond of Dieter, for some reason.

This time, Uriel is the one who spits into his palm, and Ezrah seals the deal with a quick, impish grin. Dieter tries to scowl, though his expression is soft as he looks over at Uriel. "That's terribly unhygienic, I'll have you know."

"Yes, who knows what I might catch from the saliva of an Old God," Uriel drawled, "All those years spent trawling through the Deep Roads, Sundermount and the recesses of the dark corners of the world, to be laid low by disease. Tragic."

"You're laughing now," Dieter notes, dryly, "But you won't be laughing when you're sick and moaning for healing spells."

"Your father always used to say that," Uriel observes absently, then his expression freezes, just as Dieter's does, and he sighs, out aloud. "I'm sorry, Dieter, I-"

"We really should be going," Dieter interrupts, his tone painfully neutral. "I'll see you next time, Uriel."

Outside Kirkwall, on their horses, because Ezrah has a healthy curiosity for schadenfreude and because he is bored already, he asks, "What was that about? Between you and the Viscount."

Dieter glares at him, but says nothing, and Malia pinches him pointedly on the arm in rebuke. Ezrah sulks through the rest of the ride - the forests are really no place for thieves, and for some reason nobody views his offer to fly them to Cumberland kindly. There's a resounding amount of silence, punctuated by weird sounds, rustles and animal cries, and Ezrah rather hates it. He misses the bustle of Lowtown and the visceral scents of Darktown, the shadows of Undercity. Already homesick, Ezrah withdraws, and eats dinner in unhappy silence, without even registering what the stew was.

After the second watch, as he sat on a rock overlooking the camp, within sight of the distant lights of Kirkwall, he looks up sharply when Dieter approaches him. The rest are asleep, and it's Dieter's turn to keep watch. Wordlessly, he slips off the rock, only to pause when Dieter's fingers press against his arm.

"I'm sorry," Dieter starts, solemn. "I was sharp with you. I've taken you from your home, you're so _young_... and... look, you can go back to visit whenever you want, you know."

"To visit, yes," Ezrah stresses, with heavy irony. "But not forever."

"After the war-"

"It's not my war!" Ezrah, however, keeps his voice low.

"Isn't it?" Dieter watches him steadily. "After all, you're a mage, aren't you?"

"No! I can shapeshift, fine," Ezrah admits sullenly, "But that could just be a result of whatever was in that Maker damned toy that you chained to the marketplace!"

"Listen, Ezrah," Dieter takes in a deep breath, "The Warden-Commander believes that you can stop this war. And if she believes it, then so do I. The war's been grinding on for years, don't you understand? It's claimed hundreds of thousands of _lives_. Devastated entire _countries_. And we're _losing_. If the Chantry has its way, every mage left in the world will be murdered, regardless of age, regardless of their involvement. Including your friend Malia."

Ezrah scowls at Dieter. "She chose the war. We all understood what that meant. This isn't my war, Dieter. It wasn't the Viscount's, either, was it? And he's a mage... one of the most powerful and famous ones in the world. If he can step out of the war, why can't I?"

"The Viscount has the concerns of a city on his shoulders," Dieter points out, if stiffly, as if he didn't like this topic either. "And even if he didn't, he couldn't stop a war, not one like this. You can."

"Oh yes, revive an Old God and let him lead your armies." Ezrah growls. "I thought you lot were trying to convince everyone that you wouldn't be like the Tevinter Imperium. I'm only twenty-one years old, for Maker's sake!"

"You're older than time," Dieter disagreed. "Older than human civilisation. You know what you must do, don't you? When you're, well," Dieter makes a few weird gestures in the air, and despite himself, Ezrah cracks a grin.

"Big and scaly?"

"Yes, that," Dieter deadpans.

"I still think we could fly everyone to Cumberland," Ezrah grumbles. "It'll be _much_ faster. I won't drop anyone."

"What about the horses?"

"I'll just eat them, they'll be crunchy," Ezrah muses out loud, then he grins at Dieter's horrified expression. "Got you there."

"For an Old God," Dieter sighs, "You're so... so..."

"Handsome? I'm the Old God of Beauty, aren't I?" Ezrah grins. He'd liked that part about the entire sorry business, even though Malia and Max had rolled their eyes in unison when he'd perked up at the debrief. "Engaging? Clever?"

"I was going to say _annoying_ ," Dieter supplies, though he smirks. "Get some sleep."

IV.

Cumberland is _awful_. Ezrah finds a nice roof on the top of the commandeered ducal castle which now served as some sort of war council for the remnants of the Broken Circle and their allies, and lay on top of it, listening to the horses whicker in the stables beneath. He's _bored_.

Somewhere, in the castle, Dieter is arguing with the rest of the Broken Circle about the extent of Ezrah's involvement in the war, or something, and really, Ezrah thought that this would all already have been worked out before they sent Dieter to Kirkwall to wake an Old God. It was rather late to have regrets, wasn't it?

With a gusty sigh, Ezrah rolls over onto his flank, just in time to see a slim, human woman dressed in full plate armor clamber heavily up onto the roof, the thatch creaking alarmingly as she edges carefully against the stone tower that the stable adjoined. She smiles at him, and it was a cool, flat smile, uncompromising. The air around them definitely dropped a few degrees in temperature.

"Mage?" Ezrah hazards, as he huffed at his palms.

"Good guess."

"The flash freeze was a clue," Ezrah agrees, his eyes narrowed. "Shouldn't you be at the chin up?"

"I'm due to be fashionably late, actually," the woman drawls mildly. "Nice to meet you. My name is Ella Amell."

"Err. I'm Ezrah. I'll shake your hand, except I don't feel like getting up."

"You're just like your mother," Amell observes wryly, and Ezrah frowns at her, sitting up sharply. His mother Eva Friar was a quiet, gentle woman who had never raised her voice in her life, and... "What do you mean?"

"You do know you're adopted, don't you," Amell asks, with a touch of impatience. "Asha'belannar says that you call her 'Grandmother'. She was rather inordinately pleased about it."

"Well _yes_ but I thought..." And there _had_ been a memory there, something that he hadn't grasped when he'd folded himself into his human form. "I thought it was because of her dragon form," he concludes, lamely, and Amell rolls her eyes. "Who _is_ my mother, then?" Ezrah asks, suspiciously. Come to think of it, he never did seem to resemble either of his parents, but he'd always thought that he'd inherited some throw-back genes, somewhere. Certainly neither of them had mentioned it.

"Flemeth's daughter," Amell notes vaguely. "The process was complicated. If it's of any interest to you, you're also technically, I suppose, the illegitimate son of the King of Ferelden. If he doesn't get his act together, you're possibly next in line for the throne."

"Now I know you're fucking with me," Ezrah scowls. "Honestly, you mages. I _liked_ it in Kirkwall. The Coterie had some fucked up days but it was mostly decent, and I enjoyed it-"

"And if you've finished whining," Amell adds evenly, clearly unimpressed by his outburst, "I think they're calling for you."

Ezrah is still dusting the straw off his trousers when Dieter pushes through the crowd, followed by a very old man, gently leading him by the arm. The old man is stooped, clutching a staff tightly with wrinkled fingers, his eyes rheumy and nearly blind, hair thatched in white wisps over the pale dome of his skull. "This is the Archon, Irving," Dieter introduces them gently. "Archon, may I present Urthemiel."

"Ezrah Friar," Ezrah corrects, extending a palm, ignoring how the mages around Irving murmured to themselves, and found his hand clasped in a strong, firm grip. "Pleased to meet you, sir."

"Ah, and the Warden-Commander," Irving murmurs, glancing towards the Warden-Commander. "How is Weisshaupt shaping up?"

"Weisshaupt is ready to march, Irving." the Warden-Commander declares, even as Ezrah gawps at her.

" _You're_ the Warden-Commander?"

"Good, good. We will be sending runners to the rest of the Free Marches. We will strike soon. We must defend our interests in Nevarra. Reinforce Tevinter." Irving's voice is creaky and soft, but still laced with steel. "This promises to be a very positive boost in morale."

"So what you said about the Ferelden thing is _true_? Where's my mother, then?"

"She's gone," the Warden-Commander snaps, if with a pointed glare at the fascinated, onlooking mages. "She stepped into another world. Tried to draw attention away from you, or so she said. Personally, I feel that she doesn't have a single maternal bone in her body and just wanted to get away from it all as quickly as possible. Happy now?"

"Really Flemeth's daughter?" Ezrah blinks, horrified. "But... I... but..."

"Now look what you've done," Dieter sighs, "You've broken his brain. I was going to start him on this _gently_. Ezrah, I'm sorry, it's a terrible shock, but-"

"But it's all true?"

"Um, yes..."

"I think I need a drink."

V.

Ezrah lurks around self-consciously outside the Viscount's office until all the shouting stops, then he hurriedly tucks his hands behind his back and tries not to look as though he had been, out of a sense of professional habit, wondering how much the antique Cathay statues arrayed in the display shelves would fence for.

The door swings open, and Dieter smiles brightly at him. "You can come in now."

Uriel looks pale and shaken, pacing behind his desk, paperwork arranged into militant piles and the inkpot with is quill half empty. The room smells thickly of ozone, a warning scent that Ezrah has learned to recognise after an enforced association with mages. The Viscount is still simmering.

"Kirkwall is so nice at this time of year," Ezrah declares, with manic cheerfulness, because he can turn into a dragon now on a whim and because, dragon or not, a tendency to pull the tiger's tail just to see what happened next has always been an intrinsic character flaw of his.

Uriel scowls at him. The dark circles under his eyes look pronounced, and for a moment, Ezrah feels slightly embarrassed of himself. "You've been to see your parents?" he asks, finally, politely.

"Not yet. After this."

"Good, good," Uriel decides, vaguely, and this seems all of the basic social grace that the Viscount has stored up. "Dieter tells me that you intend to invade Val Chevin."

"Val Chevin first. We need to get the ships off the seas. Those with the runes." Ezrah adds helpfully. "Clean up the Waking Seas."

"And then Val Royeaux next?" Uriel suggests, with deceptive calm.

"Maybe. Assuming that the Chantry hasn't yet decided to make nice."

Uriel throws up his hands with a snarl. "Dieter, you're allowing this _fool_ to lead the army?"

"Irving is," Dieter retorts, with unbridled calm, clearly used to Uriel Hawke's tempers. "And I trust him."

"Irving's old enough to be retired gently into a Maker-damned pasture-"

"And he's named me his successor," Dieter continues, as if he hadn't heard Uriel's protests. "I agree with the current decisions, naturally."

"You? You as the Archon?" Uriel whirls around, hands clenched. "Why in all that's holy did you accept?"

"Well," Ezrah hazarded cheerfully, "It _is_ the highest position amongst the rebel scum, your grace."

Dieter sighed. "Ezrah."

"I meant, your Excellency."

"You be quiet," Uriel growls at him, and rounds back on Dieter. "I thought better of you. I thought-"

"What did you think, love?" Dieter asks gently, ignoring Ezrah's grimace. "That perhaps, if we were to fail, you'd still be able to hide me in Kirkwall, but not the Archon? That you could keep at neutrality while taking up openly with another mage, but not the Archon? Even if you could, even if I wasn't the Archon, I wouldn't hide."

Uriel clearly wasn't a man for lying - he set his jaw and straightened up. "I had contingencies. You... you and your father, is the impulse to stack the odds against yourselves _hereditary_?"

"The Warden-Commander approved," Ezrah adds, when the ozone scent spikes; Dieter's eyes are narrowed, now.

"The Warden-Commander can be a total bitch at the-"

" _Uriel_ ," Dieter cuts in. "I asked Ezrah to take me here - emptying my stomach in the process-"

"-all over my talons," Ezrah interrupts mournfully.

"-to inform you personally of the current situation," Dieter ignores him. "I knew that you wouldn't be pleased. But we'll be making our assault on Val Chevin in a week, and before that, I wanted to see you. Ezrah wanted to see his parents, as well."

"Oh," Uriel looks briefly uncomfortable, then it fades to neutrality as he takes a breath. "Serah Friar, about your parents, if you feel that their immediate security is of any concern to you-"

"Oh no, the Coterie has that arranged, your Excellency," Ezrah shakes his head. "But thanks anyway." The Coterie is loyal to its own, after a fashion, even if the said member happened to partake in civil wars and grow scales on occasion, it seems.

"Very well then, I won't hold you." Uriel's tone is sharp with dismissal, and for a moment, Ezrah considers saying something snide indeed, about old ghosts, but Dieter nods at him and he sighs, bowing perfunctorily and retreating.

Down in the foyer, he nearly walks right into one of Uriel's very weird friends, the elvhen _hahren_ known as Merrill, and as a result of veering around her, nearly trips over the dwarven head of the Merchant's Guild, Varric Tethras. Both wear the identical expressions of people who are clearly trying not to edge upstairs to eavesdrop on a no doubt private conversation, and Ezrah arches an eyebrow at them.

"Ah, it's the dragon boy," Varric declares cheerfully, dressed colorfully as usual in a bright yellow doublet under a red jacket. "How goes the war?"

"No one seems to be clearly losing yet?"

"That's how wars are," Varric observes knowingly. "Even when you're winning, you'd never known when someone might shoot you with a crossbow."

"That's awful," Merrill pipes in. "I'm sure that Ezrah knows how to keep away from crossbows. How's Malia? Her mother does worry."

"Malia's fine, Merrill. She won't be on the front lines. She's a healer."

"Wonderboy up there is a healer and you'll find him on the front lines. Same cut of cloth as his father, really. Both reckless and crazy at the best of times. Hawke's been in one of his obsessive moods for _months_. It's great."

"He makes everyone angry and he yells a lot," Merrill supplies, rather sadly. "I can't see why he won't just have a holiday and join in the war."

"Because he has this big invisible mabari by the name of Responsibility that has a permanent grip on his ass, that's why." Varric, however, lowers his voice when he says this.

"Really?" Merrill looks mildly horrified. "That sounds painful."

"I'm going to see my parents," Ezrah tells them, because Uriel has insane friends and sometimes the insanity seems contagious.

"Yes, you run along then," Varric flaps a meaty paw at him. "No, Daisy, we're not going up that way. Dieter and Hawke are probably going to be pretty occupied for a while. Let's go talk to Aveline instead."

"Oh, very well. _Dareth shiral, Era'belannar._ " Much to his embarrassment, the _hahren_ bows to him, before trotting off towards the barracks.

"So," Varric asks, thoughtfully, in the outwardly curious way of a bard, "How did you break the fang and claw thing to your parents, anyway?"

VI.

The war, as it turns out, is an extremely sorry business, and ends years after, when they have harried the Chantry and its armies all the way to Ghislain, and there, they eventually accept its terms of surrender. Neither Dieter, the Warden-Commander, or Ezrah have any real interest in Empire-building, and as such they leave most cities with the same systems of governance. The Circles are destroyed, the factories of nullification runes closed, and the world shifts, a few bloody decades after the public razing of a Chantry in neutral Kirkwall, towards a cautious measure of equality.

Formally, there are no more Circles, but the violence of the war is difficult to erase, and there are rogue elements from the Chantry. Mages are invited to move to Rivain, Tevinter, Cumberland or Weisshaupt, at least until the status quo settles. Ezrah supposes that this is good enough, for now. At least the Exalted March has been crushed to a standstill, and eventually, a set of formal rules drafted in the wake of years of bloodshed might turn into usual, widespread practice. Hopefully.

He's stretched on his back on a sand spit on the Wounded Coast, staring at the old wrecks of ships that lace its reef-riddled shores, and he looks up when someone sits down beside him. Rather to his surprise, it's Uriel Hawke, with no sign of any guards around him.

"You could get assassinated, old man," Ezrah notes dryly.

Uriel snorts. "I'm still the strongest mage in Kirkwall, boy."

"That must be a real comfort to you when you're shot by a crossbow in the dark."

"Have you been talking to Varric again?" Uriel shakes his head. "He's a bad influence."

"Maybe." Ezrah grins broadly. "At least he appreciates me."

"Buttering your remarkably overblown draconic ego in exchange for stories isn't appreciation, Serah Friar, it's consideration," Uriel corrects, then he sobers a little. "You've changed. Did you know that?"

"Have I?"

"Dieter's gotten around to calling you 'His Scaly Majesty'," Uriel notes, and it's evasive and playful, but the mage's eyes are dark and hard.

"I know. Something about an 'overblown draconic ego', I don't think."

"We have similar opinions on some matters," Uriel inclines his head, clearly unembarrassed. "Thank you. For keeping him safe."

"I owe you a debt, don't I? Three gold coins. Dragons apparently have this thing about gold," Ezrah waves a hand dismissively. "We like to sleep on it, or so Varric tells me."

"Tried it?"

"Not in dragon form, no. I tend to roll and kick in my sleep," Ezrah elaborates, when Uriel tilts his head. "Could be tricky when I'm that big."

They share a comfortable silence, broken by the shrill cries of gulls above them, and the gentle wash of the waves, and then Uriel asks, quietly, "So what are you going to do next?"

"Dragon-y things?" Ezrah shrugs, his tone facetious. "Take over Tevinter? Amass a giant hoard of gold to sleep on? Eat virgins? Might be a bit difficult, that last bit, virgins tend to be in pretty short supply in cities... I'm _joking_ , Hawke," Ezrah adds dryly, when Uriel tenses almost imperceptibly.

"You're an Old God, Ezrah."

"I'm also human most of the time. Right now, anyway. And I don't have any real urge to start yet another war after I just finished one, all right?"

"All right," Uriel agrees, and Ezrah frowns at him. Uriel is wearing his armor, his favorite spear-staff resting on the ground beside him, his belt kitted with potions, as though he was out for war, rather than a quick stroll down the beach. Granted, you couldn't be too careful, with the Wounded Coast, but why didn't Dieter, or Carver, or any of Uriel's insane friends tag along?

"Did you come here to kill me?" Ezrah asks, finally, incredulous.

"That depended on your answer to my question," Uriel replies evenly, mildly.

"Suddenly, I'm not sure which of us has the bigger ego." Ezrah muses.

"I've a good track record against dragons," Uriel informs him, though he grins as he says this.

"What about gods, my friend?"

"Ah well, perhaps if I disbelieve in you hard enough," Uriel shrugs, wearing self-confidence like an armor, and he clearly hasn't seemed to have thought that this would be an issue. Grudgingly, Ezrah is impressed. He isn't really sure whether it's with Uriel's imperious demeanor, or with his apparent obliviousness to the inevitable.

Then again, Uriel Hawke arrived in Kirkwall a penniless refugee, and rose in ranks despite having not a spot of blue blood in him into the throne of the Viscount. The mage beside him does have a rather good record of beating the odds...

Thinking this over, Uriel adds, dryly, "I'm not thinking of any dragonslaying right now, by the way."

Sulkily, Ezrah notes, "But you _were_."

"Maybe." Uriel tells him calmly. "You might even learn some humility. It'll build character."

"I'll give you building character, _old man_..."

Dieter happens on them when the bickering is just getting into stride, and rolls his eyes as though he's the only mature party present. "Honestly, the two of you."

"Hawke came out here to kill me!" Ezrah protests, ignoring the dirty look that Uriel shoots him. He _is_ ex (or presently still?) Coterie, after all. Backstabbing is a refined art.

"I'm sure that he didn't mean it," Dieter assures him, in the vague tone of a besotted fool, when Uriel changes gears and smiles warmly at him, getting to his feet and dusting sand off his breeches, then Ezrah makes a gagging sound when Uriel pulls Dieter close to suck his face.

"Ezrah," Dieter rebukes him, once they're done, and he's flushed.

"Don't mind him," Uriel strokes Dieter's back with gentle palms. "He's probably still a virgin."

"I am _not_ ," Ezrah yelps, and when Dieter guffaws, he snarls, "Not since I was seventeen!"

"Very good, Serah Friar," Uriel tells him paternally.

"I'm going to set fire to your keep. Also," Ezrah adds sweetly, "Have you decided on Dieter yet? Because he attracts female - and male - attention in Cumberland like you would not believe."

Uriel stiffens, even as Dieter sighs. "Ezrah, you know that isn't true."

"I know what I know," Ezrah tells him smugly, because he has the morals of a thief and the mouth of a fishwife, according to Sofia, "I don't see the problem. You're both disgustingly in love with each other and the third wheel is dead."

"Was he always like this, or is it a byproduct of victory going to his already considerably inflated head?" Uriel asks Dieter, though his jaw is set and his arms around Dieter's waist seem to have tightened.

"I'm not going to discuss this with you, Ezrah," Dieter tells him primly, though the tips of his mouth lift, briefly, before the smile slips, then he gently disengages from Uriel's embrace. "Come on. It's growing late, and your brother's been looking for you."

Uriel watches Dieter pick his way back up the beach to the road, and he sighs. "Am I really that foolish, Serah Friar?"

"Is my opinion that bloody obvious?"

"It's..." Uriel hesitates, then he sighs. "I'll see you back at the keep," he amends, and hurries up the beach after Dieter. Ezrah shakes his head, and pillows his skull on his arms as he turns back up to watch the sky. If he closes his eyes, he can hear the songs of the names of the stars.

**Author's Note:**

> Exploring Ezrah's POV was fun. :) Hope you enjoyed this, beingevil!
> 
> Regarding any edit problems, I will see if I can do that back in Melbourne. This ancient laptop that I'm posting on nearly crashed when I tried to load Word. -_-;


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